“It’s not what you think,” he said with his own grimace. “Joss came by to grab some papers, and Remy decided she didn’t like my shirt today.”
Remy was his baby girl, meaning the fluid was still human, but nowhere near as nasty as it could’ve been.
“How’s family life treating you?” I asked.
Even while wiping spit-up from his shirt, his smile was big and immediate. “It’s the fuckin’ best.”
I used to want kids back when I was one. Hell, growing up as an only child with subpar parents, I wanted everything I never had. Multiple kids so they had siblings. A wife I actually liked. A happy home where no one walked on eggshells or hid in the garage till they were too cold to feel their fingers.
All that changed by the time I was around fifteen or so. I was the living embodiment of literally fucking around and finding out. If it weren’t for me, my parents wouldn’t have gotten married in the first place, and we all would’ve been saved from miserable years that dragged on till they drained the optimism out of me.
And then shit went down that made it crystal fuckin’ clear that I didn’t want any of it. Call it cowardly. Call it protecting myself. I didn’t give a damn. I made sure history couldn’t repeat itself by getting snipped, being safe, and keeping things surface-level.
And I’d been happy with that for a long time.
That happiness had already started to wane before Lo, but I’d never doubted that I didn’t want to even settle down, much less have kids.
Which was why my gut going hollow all of a sudden caught me off-guard.
Unaware of the envy throwing me for a damn loop, Lars jerked his chin toward the other side of the room. “Let’s talk in my office.”
I followed him through a guarded door and back to his office.
He took a seat behind a desk and gestured for me to sit. “So how’s that scenery going?” I didn’t get the chance to answer before he grinned. “That smile doesn’t look fake.”
“’Cause there’s nothing fake about it.”
“Nox said you looked like you had it bad. Kept talking about fate and shit.”
I didn’t deny any of it. I wasn’t climbing on the stage at Rye to sing power ballads to declare my love or anything, but I also wasn’t trying to force that space I’d used as a protective barrier for over a decade.
I would take getting hurt by Lo over not having her at all.
“She on board, or are you chasing her around, pulling her ponytail to get a rise outta her?”
“Oddly specific.”
He smiled and shrugged.
“Was doing the last one before I pulled my head from my ass,” I admitted.
“I’m telling you, that turning point hits, and that’s it. You start to wonder why you were riding the brakes instead of gunning it toward something infinitely better.”
That was a damn accurate analogy. All the effort I’d put into keeping her away had suddenly redirected to getting her closer.Getting more of her laughter. More of her attitude. More of her on her knees.
More of her.
I gestured over my shoulder. “How’s business?”
“It’s been a wild month, man. Girls ghosting and then trying to come back. Costs skyrocketing with no notice, leaving me scrambling to find new distributors. The last year has been calm. Or as calm as this business ever is. You get it. But in the last few weeks, it’s been a rotation of shitty customers and random bullshit calls to the cops about underage girls, underage customers, and every other fuckin’ thing you could think of. I had to close for a thorough inspection a few weeks ago because someone reported bedbugs, black mold, and a gas leak for good measure. The night of lost income hurt, but the ding to my reputation?” He shook his head. “That digs deep.”
I sat forward. “How many weeks ago was this?”
“Almost three.”
“That’s the same day someone set me up to look like I was holding an employee hostage before I was shot at.”
“There’s no way that’s a coincidence.”
